September 19th 2016 (UK) Archives - Big Gay Picture Show

Hide & Seek (DVD Review)

October 21, 2016 By Tim Isaac Leave a Comment

Starring: Josh O'Connor, Hannah Arterton, Rea Mole, Daniel Metz, Joe Banks
Director: Joanna Coates
Running Time: 82 mins
Certificate: 18
Release Date: September 19th 2016 (UK)

Four 20-somethings – two men and two women – arrive at a house in the country with a plan to create a new community, where they will shut themselves off from the outside world. There are a few rules, such as that a couple – a different combination each time – will be locked into the master bedroom every night and not allowed out until the morning. They all also gather each evening to play games, talk and watch performances. They have no external contact, don’t pay attention to the news and try to create something carefree and almost childlike.

The bonds between the quartet start to deepen as they share each other’s lives, which includes various combinations of sexual sharing, initially between boy-girl couplings before becoming more bisexual and polyamorous. However, when someone from one of their pasts comes to visit, it threatens to disrupt their carefully created world. [Read more…]

Author: The JT Leroy Story (DVD Review)

September 18, 2016 By Tim Isaac 1 Comment

Starring: Laura Albert, Billy Corgan, Savannah Knoop, Geoff Knoop, Asia Argento
Director: Jeff Feuerzeig
Running Time: 110 mins
Certificate: 15
Release Date: September 19th 2016 (UK)

If you’d never heard of JT Leroy before watching this documentary, I wouldn’t be surprised if you paused it about halfway through to check Wikipedia to see whether all this really happened or whether they’re making it up. It’s an almost unbelievable tale that’s perfect fodder for a good doc, and Author provides it, even if you can’t help wishing there was a little more context.

If you don’t know, in the late 1990s and early 2000s Jeremiah Terminator Leroy was a bit of an enfant terrible of literature, gaining a huge following for his tales of living with a junkie truckstop prostitute mother, becoming a teen hustler and having to survive terrible abuse, all of which was semi-based on his own life. Initially terribly reclusive, Leroy eventually started making public appearances, gaining a cadre of celebrity fans and admirers – from Tom Waits to Courtney Love – and becoming a worldwide cult icon. He was gay, trans (today he might have been described as genderqueer as his gender identity shifted depending on how he felt) and looked almost like a teen Andy Warhol, complete with blond wig. [Read more…]

Friend Request (Blu-ray Review)

September 18, 2016 By Tim Isaac Leave a Comment

Starring: Alycia Debnam-Carey, Brit Morgan, Brooke Markham, Connor Paolo, William Moseley
Director: Simon Verhoeven
Running Time: 92 mins
Certificate: 15
Release Date: September 19th 2016 (UK)

After a brief chat following a lecture, college student Laura accepts a social network friend request from classmate Marina. However, Marina refuses to be someone who sits in your friend list and gets ignored, as she embarks on increasingly unhinged stalker behaviour, which culminates in her sending a video of her own suicide to Laura.

Death isn’t going to stop Marina though, as Laura’s friends start being attacked. As those she knows start dying around her, the authorities begin to think Laura must somehow be involved, but it becomes clear something more supernatural is at work. [Read more…]

A Hologram For The King (Blu-ray Review)

September 18, 2016 By Tim Isaac 1 Comment

Starring: Tom Hanks, Alexander Black, Sarita Choudhury, Sidse Babett Knudsen
Director: Tom Tykwer
Running Time: 98 mins
Certificate: 12
Release Date: September 19th 2016 (UK)

Alan (Tom Hanks) is a middle-aged businessman whose life isn’t turning out how he planned. His boss doesn’t think he’s particularly good at his job, he’s divorced, and feels a bit of a failure towards his daughter as his debt means he can’t afford to pay her college tuition fees. However, he now has a new opportunity, heading off to Saudi Arabia to give a presentation about a holographic IT system to the King.

He expects to be a stranger in a strange land, but finds that in some ways things are more similar that he expected, while in others they’re more strange. He gets into a bit of a Waiting For Godot situation where he spends much of his time being palmed off and ignored as he waits for the arrival on the King, who may never turn up. He also discovers the massive city his company is hoping to get the IT contract for, is nothing but a welcome centre in the desert, waiting for other building to come along. [Read more…]